Fibre channel (FC) switch ports can be used by hosts and targets to login to a switch in a storage area network (SAN) fabric. The SAN fabric typically includes a collection of switches that share a database. The SAN fabric can be of the form of a native FC fabric or a FC over Ethernet (FCoE) fabric. When a host logs in to a SAN fabric, the host login process is driven by the switch and FC SAN fabric. Characteristics of the host, such as a host address, are typically defined during the login process by the FC SAN fabric. These aspects of FC operation can impact virtualization of the host and virtual machine mobility.